Jeff Speakman (The Perfect Weapon, Running Red) plays Jared Stone, the leader of a team of Army Rangers flying on the Space Shuttle up to the Scorpio One space station. But there’s a rotten apple or four among all the people on the Shuttle (there’s as many bad guys as good guys on the flight!) and it isn’t long before dudes are having their helmets unsealed accidentally, depressurized in an air lock accidentally, or cutting Stone’s air hose accidentally. Hey, these space flights are a risky business! I’ve seen that Apollo 13 movie, so I know!
When the bad guys finally reveal their hand and you realize who their leader is, you’ll have no choice but to watch the rest of the movie about a foot away from your TV while standing! Because facing off against low-budget American action film legend Jeff Speakman is low budget Italian action film legend Brent Huff!
Brent fricking Huff? Three time Bruno Mattei survivor from Cop Game, Born to Fight, and Strike Commando 2? Huffbo vs. Kenpo? That’s like Aliens vs. Predator vs. the Terminator vs. Robocop, but with guys who are super bad ass!
And make no mistake, this clash wasn’t some lame tease. Speakman and Huff go toe to toe all across this space station! Speakman even wails away on Huff with a fire extinguisher and uses his Kenpo super powers to inflict a lighting fast pummeling to Huff’s skull!
But then again, you’ve got to remember that Huff was probably the only guy in the universe who could have taken over for the original Strike Commando and not been laughed off the screen! You better believe that Huff gave as good as he got! At least before Speakman whupped him into an air lock and shucked his evil ass out into space!
All of which by itself would put Scorpio One into anyone’s “10 Best Low Budget Action Movies Starring Guys That Sound Familiar For Some Reason” list. Except that I haven’t even mentioned the star of Scorpio One!
But you’re saying that I’ve already mentioned Speakman and Huff! Sure, but I’m talking about the guy who gets top billing. A guy named Carradine. As in Robert Carradine. As in Revenge Of The Nerds Robert Carradine!
Carradine plays an astronaut who ends up helping Speakman out during their battle with the traitorous Army Rangers! I’ll be the first to admit I was skeptical when I realized that Lewis from the Tri-Lams was going to be mixing it up with a couple of my Silver Screen idols, but damned if that nerd didn’t hold his own!
I dare anyone to watch the scene where a mortally wounded Carradine sacrifices himself so that Speakman can escape in an Apollo capsule back to Earth and he and Speakman shake hands while Speakman wishes him well “on the other side.” I’m sobbing as I type this! And then Carradine and his commander salute each other! Most powerful moment in my life ever!
The actual story is idiotic which is to be expected from the writer and the director of Speakman’s hideous killer satellite flick Memorial Day. It involves a floppy disc with notes on how to achieve cold fusion and I never figured out just why the guy at the beginning of the movie had to sabotage everything when he could have just stolen the disc or copied it.
Even worse are all the Earthbound scenes detailing the scheming of NASA and a senator to outwit each other in something or other. It has zero bearing on the story and forces Speakman to participate in a flat ending where he watches an old fart drive a car off an overpass. The movie should have ended when Speakman and friends successfully splashed down in the ocean in their escape capsule.
In any case, this is the sort of movie where a guy who doesn’t know how to fly a shuttle tries to fly it back to Earth anyway! Without all the heat shielding on it! I wouldn’t mind though if Scorpio One was the in-flight movie!
© 2013 MonsterHunter
